Sexual Trauma Within the Context of Traumatic and Inescapable Stress, Neglect, and Poisonous Pedagogy by Mark F. Schwartz, Lori D. Galperin, and William H. Masters Post-traumatic Stress The Diagnostic Statistical Manual-III (DSM-III) defines posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as the result of a recognizable stressor that would evoke significant symptoms of distress in almost anyone (American Psychiatric Association, 1987, p. 236). The implication of this terminology is that the natural response to such trauma is PTSD — that the response is not an “illness” and that any person experiencing an event of that magnitude is likely to be similarly affected. Thus, rather than stigmatizing trauma victims by assigning to them a mental disorder,...